Implementation of the SMS went very poorly where I was working at the time. It seemed like a huge CYA project on the company’s behalf. The crew had to simultaneously run the ship and maintain what seemed like an unrelated SMS.
It took the crew a long time to understand the purpose of the system and a major revision before it became useful.
Seems to me SMS replaced common sense, which is no longer common. Finding a skilled mariner is the real answer and training them appropriately. Instead u got 5 different books to tell u how to train someone, so they can meet a minimum standard. Give me a person who wants to learn is smart and can solve problems without a checklist. Flush the rest. Train the trainable!
I was doing a night job on a container ship in Seattle one night. At about 0600 hrs. I found some oil leaking onto the deck that if not stopped would run into the water. So I called the C/M.
At one point the C/M told me to go to his office and call the engine room. I went to his office and on his desk he had two identical phones (one shoreside) and no list of phone numbers. I had to call the mate on the radio to figure out how to call the engine room from his office.
C/M knew from memory which phone was which and what the E/R phone number was. The only way I could access that information was call the C/M and ask. The C/M didn’t seem pleased with that arrangement that particular morning.
So it boils down to an information problem. Dealing with an unexpected situation where all the information required to deal with it is stored in peoples heads is going to suffer inefficiencies with regards to accessing that information.
SorryI you had to go through that. I would like to think that type of operation is transparent, Obviously not. With OPA 90, it should be with anything oil related. How long ago did this happen with you? Asking for a “friend” in the container industry to cover his ass. He has many phones on his desk.
Okay Im calling bs. There are phones everywhere on ships and u could only call from cm office. All the sms programs I have ever seen don’t have phone numbers in them. Not sure what point about sms your trying to make but every space I have been in has a phone in it. Wether sound powered or princess phone.
Had 5 sound powered phones aboard, one each to the Engine room, Galley, Masters quarters, and both Wheel houses… No numbers, only on the selector, (1 thru 5) named by where you needed to call, just crank the handle ring it. Very efficient and simple.
The example of the phones might not have been the best choice, but it not about the phone. It’s the information needed to use the phone was not where it was needed when it was needed. Sure there are workarounds, could have sprinted back up to the bridge where I called the C/M in the first place. I used the hand held radio because it seemed faster.
Likewise the information required to run the boat was printed on the boat’s COI. The definition of a roving watch is in the CFRs.
So it’s not a matter of the information not existing, it’s not where it was needed at the time it was needed.
Understand the issue. That had to suck.
I see your concern that a Safety Management Manual can grow at such a rapid rate that locating information within it can become difficult. I think that’s where having a mariner on the implementation team can really help. Someone to say, “hey shoreside office, it’s great that you want to put another copy of the SMS at the helm so it’s always on-hand, but what if we just extracted the checklists for key operations like loading passengers, mooring, emergencies, etc., and put them at the operating station?” An SMS that’s not functional is going to be pushed aside and will only come off the shelf a couple weeks before the auditor arrives.
What could be challenging is that a lot of domestic small passenger vessels, outside of some of the busier ferry operations, are seasonal operations that might not even have a mariner on the full-time payroll. Hopefully the owners of these companies realize the challenges and are able to envision functional systems, or bring in others who can help them with that.
Maybe I was sailing with a particular bad batch but the senior officers I was with at the time were the ones making it worse. They wanted to post multiple pages at each station.
I think if we had a better understanding of the principles behind SMS implementation would have gone smoother.
Looking at examples from the way we were doing things pre-SMS, using the way we identified the risk associated with bad heading info and looking at the procedures in place to check and log compass error would have been a useful template.
Well there goes my hypothesis! I wouldn’t have imagined the officers onboard trying to complicate matters rather than simplify them. Interesting to hear.
Yes, very much so. At least where I was.
The thinking was:
On deep-sea ships pre-SMS mates standing in-port watches used to write in the log book something along the lines of “Lights, lines, gangway tended, rounds made, all found in good order”.
Had a similar practice been in place on dive boats it would have been simple to verify that the crew at least was aware of the requirement of such things as a roving watch.
The approach of a SMS should be to follow the principle of how things are done on a well run ship.
A well run ship would not necessarily maintain a separate list of phone numbers. If it did address the issue it might simply be a requirement that all the ship’s phones be kept in working order and have the list of phone numbers posted in plain sight close to the phone.
Are u kidding me have u ever worked on a ship? Serious question. Apparently u dont know how to find phone numbers on a ship. Even the worst ships I have been on have every emergency contact u can think of. The phones on the ship have the numbers of the spaces posted next to them. Sound powered phones have the number and space listed on the phone. Maybe just maybe u should actually go to sea and see how ships actually work. Not saying this to be a dick but sounds to me you have very little time off shore.
SMS is a paper pushers wet dream. There is some value to it, but for the most part it was created by cubicle monkeys with little real world experience. Just because you have sms doesnt mean your safe.
Yikes! Says they guy who joined the forum three days ago to the forum Moderator holding an Unlimited Masters license from a career at sea…
This is why I stay off forums Yikes to the shipeng who because I joined a day ago I have no experience! 34 years at sea half as Master and yes I have an Ocean Masters. I know where to find phone numbers without an sms manual to tell me.
So this will be my last post and I’m done with G Captain forums. Hope you all figure this out.
I think we all agree the phone wasn’t the best example related to the pros and cons of a sms.
The point is no one just assumed you have no experience, but since you just showed up don’t just assume no one else does either.
Yes, bad example. My point was asking crew members who are familiar with the ship and the routine are not the correct people to evaluate the usefulness of a SMS because they personally do not see the value of it.
An example of “How could you get lost in this city? I’ve lived here my whole life and I’ve never been lost.”
At the beginning of the California dive boat trade coming under USCG inspection (50 years ago?), owners probably decided that the “fine print” on the COI was just bullshit put on there by some incompetent USCG kid from Nebraska that didn’t understand the economics of their business. So as a practical matter, they just keep doing things the way they had before, with no roving watch because they “could not afford extra crew for that.”
The USCG is grossly incompetent, and engages in contributory negligence, when it fails to require enough crew on the COI.
From what I have observed, the USCG is just going along with the owners on the number of crew they want to pay. Hence, all the Subchapter M COIs that only require 4 men on a coastwise tug.